Go, stranger, and at Lacedaemon tell
That here obedient to her laws we fell.
Another public epitaph, also belonging to some of the heroes of the Persian wars, has been found at Megara[244]. It is not, however, the original record, but a copy made of that record when it had almost perished with age in the fourth or fifth century of our aera by one Helladius, who attributes to Simonides the verses which run thus:—
Eager we strove that freedom’s day might rise
For Greece and home; but death is all our prize.
Some fell beside Euboea’s sacred strand,
Where Artemis, chaste huntress, holds the land:
Some died at Mycale; some the warlike show
Of Tyrian fleets at Salamis laid low:
Some in Boeotian plains, in daring mood,
The charging Median chivalry withstood.
Here in full market[245], ’mid the thronging crowd,
Our townsmen have our honoured grave allowed.
This epitaph was evidently placed on the public grave of the Megarian citizens who fell in the various battles against the Persians. It was no doubt a cenotaph. Pausanias mentions it, and states that the Megarians set the graves of their distinguished dead in the senate-house, so that all future generations might consult in presence of the heroes: Helladius adds, ‘even in my day a bull is sacrificed by the city.’ An epitaph in the market-place and the annual sacrifice of a bull for a thousand years might well supply to the Greek soldier an incentive as great as among us the hope of a monument in Westminster Abbey.
A similar monument in honour of the Athenians who fell at Potidaea, in the Peloponnesian War, is preserved at the British Museum[246]. We may also consider as public a tomb erected at Corfu by Amphilochian soldiers to one of their comrades who had fallen in a skirmish on the opposite coast[247]. It dates from about the third century B.C.:—
For thee a bitter fate thy friends behold
Of Amphilochian land the warriors bold,
When by Illyrian horse in battle slain
Within an island tomb thy bones remain.
They left thee not, when thou wast lying low,
Thy comrades brave well-skilled the dart to throw;
From deadly battle-press thy corpse they save,
And mourning kinsmen bear thee to the grave.
Public epitaphs such as these are in the highest degree objective. They recount the deeds of a hero and deplore his death, but they seldom indulge in moral reflection, or speak of any future life. This is in fact the character of all early epitaphs, whether from private or public graves. I will cite a few of the sixth century to begin with.
The tomb of Menecrates at Corfu is well known to many travellers, from its beautiful situation. The inscription, written in archaic characters of Corinth, runs thus[248]: ‘This tomb is of Menecrates son of Tlesias of the race of Oeanthe: the people raised it to him. He was proxenus, beloved by the people, and died at sea, and was buried by the stroke of oars of the public ships[249]. Praximenes, coming from his native city, raised with the people this memorial to his brother.’ Menecrates seems to have been consul or proxenus of Corinth at Corcyra, and was succeeded in that office by his brother Praximenes.
The sculptured lion found on the spot may belong to the tomb of Menecrates; but it more probably belongs to another tomb of the same age erected to one Arniadas, which bears a very simple record[250], ‘This is the tomb of Arniadas: bright-eyed Ares was his death, as he fought by the ships at the streams of Arathus, doing many valiant deeds in the sad battle-strife.’
The qualities of moderation, of self-control and of nobility which belong pre-eminently to almost all Greek productions of the fifth century, are in nothing to be observed more clearly than in the epitaphs of that period. A few specimens will suffice as well as many to exhibit this character. Many or most of them record a death in battle: it appears that only when a man thus died for his country or was otherwise especially distinguished, was he allowed an epitaph recording more than his name and that of his father. A grave at Anactorium[251] of the fifth century bears the inscription, ‘This tomb near the way shall be called by the name of Procleidas, who died fighting for his country.’ Another at Thisbe[252] in Boeotia reads, ‘Dear to citizens and friends I fell in the front ranks fighting valiantly.’ The following record civic or personal rather than military merit. From Thespiae[253], ‘As a memorial over Olaidas when he died I was erected by his father Ossilus, to whom his departure brought sorrow.’ From Tanagra[254], ‘Thy native city, Cercinus son of Phoxius, Heracleia in Pontus, shall have sorrow at thy death among our friends; so never shall we forget thy praise: greatly did I admire thy nature.’ The ‘I’ of the former of these two epitaphs is the tombstone; the ‘I’ of the second is a sorrowing friend.